THE TIGER AND THE TORCH look book

PAST, PRESENT & FUTURE

PAST, PRESENT & FUTURE MEET IN CHARLOTTESVILLE, VA UNIVERSITY OF VIRGINIA & MONTICELLO Walkway Stone on the UVA Campus: Image Credit: uvamagzine.org 135 Unearthing the hundreds of years of the experiences of enslaved people before and after the Civil War is an opportunity to fill in critical gaps in African American History. Monticello 136 and the University of Virginia (UVA) 137 in Charlottesville, VA were centuries in the making. Yet, it has not been until recently that they began to do more research and start publicizing the lives of the many African Americans involved in building those places. To begin formally acknowledging the significant role Africans Americans had, there is now a permanent stone in a walkway on the UVA campus. An article in UVA Magazine entitled “Unearthing Slavery” 138 talks about how both organizations began researching their full history and how that stone in the walkway came into existence. The combined significance of the lives of the people who lived and came through these places, in conjunction with the architectural significance of the structures themselves affirms one of the many reasons why Monticello and UVA are on the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO) World Heritage List. 139 This designation places local history on a global platform and broadens the discussion of how African American history connects abroad. THETIGER & THETORCH Page | 84

ROAR! “BLACK PEOPLE SHOULD HAVE RECOGNITION FOR THEMSELVES ANDTHEIR BACKGROUNDS ANDTHEIR RELATIONSHIPS WITH OTHER PEOPLE IN THE WORLD AND THUS LOSE SOME OF THEIR ALIENATION.” 140 KATHERINE DUNHAM At Monticello, the Thomas Jefferson Foundation started a history project called “Getting Word”. It successfully merges onsite and online experiences that invite the ancestors of the African Americans who lived there to interact with their history in a truly unique way. The foundation archives those experiences and then shares them with the public. The project started, “…in 1993 to preserve the histories of the African American families at Thomas Jefferson’s Virginia plantation.” 141 Image Credit: Screenshot of https://www.monticello.org/getting-word While UVA and Monticello are still bustling places for people to visit, many other places are not. Throughout the United States, a person can sometimes tell where Black neighborhoods used to be, where growing businesses used to be, and where community gathering places used to be. Unfortunately, sometimes absolutely nothing remains. Yet, there are some lone survivors. These places remind us of previous decades and are a testament to the early sacrifices and accomplishments of our elders. For those African American buildings that remain, they are primarily made of bricks and mortar; however, they represent the fortitude of Black people and being able to successfully bring together the past, the present and the future. ROAR! “A PEOPLE WITHOUT THE KNOWLEDGE OF THEIR PAST HISTORY, ORIGIN AND CULTURE IS LIKE A TREE WITHOUT ROOTS.” 142 MARCUS GARVEY THETIGER & THETORCH Page | 85